Gather ye together a small group of well-adjusted yet unabashedly non-macho men (usually not women -- more on that later), hand selected for their obsessive adoration of music and their variegated preferences and their curious taste in shoes, and also for their ability to drink and self-deprecate and laugh easily and look at each other like each was sort of crazy for his weird and borderline insane styles. But, you know, in a good way.

Everyone brings a specially burned CD or custom iPod mix (carefully considered and chosen beforehand) and everyone brings either something outstanding to drink or something exceptional to smoke or something rather deliciously unhealthy to eat. The latter is usually gourmet pizza. The former is usually fine rum, scotch, wine or beer. The middle one is usually illegal.

Someone has a very good stereo. Someone has a very good stereo with outstanding audiophile-grade speakers that, when played at high volume, will shake the walls and rattle the windows and peel back your skin without getting all fuzzy and distorted and annoying, loud enough that the sound they produce will easily prevent all discussion until the given song has ended and everyone can breathe again and grab another drink and say, Wow, what the hell was that? (This someone, obviously, also has very understanding neighbors.)

It is called a listening party. It is a loosely directed but passionately devised gathering held purely for the love and discovery of, well, music. New music. Old music. Loud music. Music played at volumes you can't even enjoy in your car without blowing out the sunroof and messing up your hair and drowning out all the urban sirens.

But it is not solely about volume. It is about quality. It is about range. It is, perhaps more than anything else, about surprise. In other words, you do not bring some common hit song to the listening party, some standard tune that everyone's heard a million times by an artist that makes most people wince.

You do not bring, say, Nickelback. You do not bring Green Day. Celine Dion will get you shot after the first bar. Someone once played Blink-182 and he has since been happily and relentlessly taunted and shall never live it down. You may very well bring "Stairway to Heaven," but only if it is "Stairway to Heaven" as performed by an all-lesbian country-punk band from Norway who recorded it on a four-track at some obscure festival just before their singer died from an aneurysm bungee jumping from her Harley.

In other words, you bring something interesting, unexpected. It can be a mainstream band, but the song should be sonically fascinating, well recorded, somehow unique, not something you will hear much on KROQ or that you can find all that easily on iTMS. Yes, there is a certain clunky snobbishness to it all. We do not care. It's our party. You may, of course, set your own parameters. Besides, after two drinks and a smoke, it all sounds really, really good.

Examples? You got it. In the four parties we've held to date, we've played songs by everyone from Nick Cave to Joe Henry to Marilyn Manson (who, as you might imagine, sounds absolutely orgasmic at loud volumes). There has been Earth, Wind & Fire and bootlegged Radiohead and "The Flesh Failures/Let the Sunshine In" from the original soundtrack to the movie "Hair." Another thing: Often, songs like these will be played back to back. The random mix is part of the joy. It sounds like the coolest radio station you've never heard.

We've had Built to Spill, The Crystal Method's "Trip Like I Do," Martha Wainwright's "B.M.F.A." and Tool's "The Pot." There has been Goldfrapp, Jimmy Scott, Art Blakey, a remix of Primal Scream's "Swastika Eyes." Also Public Enemy. Temptations. Spiritualized. "Maggot Brain" by Funkadelic. A delirious cover of The White Stripes' "Seven Nation Army" by jazz-torqued British DJ Nostalgia 77 (highly recommended, BTW).

There can be moments of epiphany. Last meeting someone whipped out a wicked psychedelic porn-funk version of Zep's "Whole Lotta Love" most of us had never heard. No one could figure out who the hell the incredible singer was. Turns out it was none other than pre-wig, pre-Vegas Tina Turner, from her barely known "Acid Queen" album circa 1970. Amazing.

There are about four full rounds. Maybe five. Everyone gets to play a single track in each round. The fun part: You do not announce your song. You do not let it be known whose tune is coming up next. You let the music speak for itself. You let the surprise happen. You get to test your musical knowledge, also how well you know the other participants ("Dude, I knew that Nina Simone techno remix was yours"). This is part of the adventure.

After each full round, a short break for more pizza, drink refills, smoking, chat. Rounds progress. Themes emerge. Moods shift and ebb and flow. Amazing synchronicities and juxtapositions occur. You discover songs, new bands, maybe entire genres you never knew existed. Your tastes expand, your musical horizons broaden. This is much of the point. It's chaos theory, with a kickass soundtrack.

Did I say it's mostly a men's thing? Indeed. Fact is, rare is the woman who would like to do nothing but listen to random music at such ear-jarring volumes. Rare is the woman who would enjoy just sitting there, drink in hand, eyes closed and head bobbing (though dancing is always allowed), and just let the tune wash over her body, without speaking. As the cliche goes, it's just sort of a guy thing.

Not that we haven't tried. "Wait-wait-wait," women say, when invited in the past. "So you just, like, sit there? You just sit there and blast unusual music and drink?" Well, yes. "You don't talk, share, emote about it?" Only a little. "So the songs aren't background music for your discussions of how weird our spouses are and where to get the best designer jeans and why the Bush administration is so full of misogynist jackals?" Well, not exactly. See, the music is its own language. "Oh," they say, looking slightly nonplussed. "I think I'll stay home and watch 'The Colbert Report.'"

"Well, OK," you reply, shrugging. "But you'll be missing out. I'm bringing 'Joker & The Thief' from the new Wolfmother. Plus, someone's bound to play some old Kate Bush. Or maybe some deep Southern blues. Maybe some Iron & Wine. All really, really loud. I mean, come on. Who'd want to miss that?"

Mark Morford's Notes & Errata column appears every Wednesday and Friday on SF Gate and in the Datebook section of the SF Chronicle. To get on the e-mail list for this column, please click here and remove one article of clothing. Mark's column also has an RSS feed and an archive of past columns, which includes another tiny photo of Mark probably insufficient for you to recognize him in the street and give him gifts.

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